KUALA LUMPUR: Bursa Malaysia opened firmer this morning in line with the positive sentiment of its regional peers which spurred investors” risk appetite.

At 9.04 am, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) stood at 1,744.76, up 3.16 points, from Thursday“s close of 1,741.61. The key index opened 0.62 of-a-point better 1,742.23.

Gains in Maybank and CIMB boosted the composite index by a total contribution of 2.42 points. Maybank chalked up seven sen to RM9.15 and CIMB rose eight sen to RM5.58.

A dealer said Bursa was set to perform well today, tracking the overnight bullish trading on Wall Street which saw Nasdaq close on a record high following a series of positive corporate earnings in the country.

He also said Japanese stocks, which were likely to continue its upward momentum today on the back of the softer yen following Bank of Japan Governor Haruhiko Kuroda“s remark that the central bank has no plans to slow its quantitative easing programme, would also provide an uplift to regional sentiment.

Back home, the overall market breadth was positive with gainers overtaking losers 161 to 63, while 181 counters remained unchanged with 1,346 untraded and 17 others were suspended.

Turnover stood at 139.6 million shares worth RM65.84 million.

Of heavyweights, Public Bank perked four sen to RM19.96 while Sime Darby and IHH Healthcare were flat at RM9.26 and RM6.02, respectively. Tenaga fell eight sen to RM13.72 and Petronas Chemicals eased two sen to RM7.50.

Among actives, Eversafe increased 5.5 sen to 41.5 sen, both Key Alliance and IRIS Corp inched up half-a-sen each to nine sen and 17.5 sen, respectively, but Perwaja Holdings slipped 2.5 sen to three sen.

On the scoreboard, the FBM Emas Index was 20.95 points higher at 12,419.22, the FBMT100 Index advanced 20.13 points to 12,055.6, the FBM 70 increased 18.18 points to 14,672.37 and the FBM Ace rose 30.59 points to 6,126.43.